"Why don't we take all our weekends in the fall"
I'm sitting in the lounge by myself. It's quiet.
I'm reading Francine Prose and am absolutely amazed by a sentence that she has deconstructed by Virginia Woolf.
Considering how common illness is, how tremendous the spiritual change that it brings, how astonishing, when the lights of health go down, the undiscovered countries that are then disclosed, what wastes and deserts of the soul a slight attack of influenza brings to view, what precipices and lawns sprinkled with bright flowers a little rise of temperature reveals, what ancient and obdurate oaks are uprooted in us by the act of sickness, how we go down into the pit of death and feel the waters of annihilation close above our heads and wake thinking to find ourselves in the presence of the angels and the harpers when we have a tooth out and come to the surface in the dentist's arm-chair and confuse his "Rinse the mouth-rinse the mouth" with the greeting of the Deity stooping from the floor of Heaven to welcome us-when we think of this, as we are so frequently forced to think of it, it becomes strange indeed that illness has not taken its place with love and battle and jealousy among the prime themes of literature.
One sentence. That's 181 words in one. full. sentence.
Whilst reading this book (and a few others), my writing faith that I thought was lost, was found once again. It was restored and I was reminded why I love writing so much. It's not just because I love telling a story, but it is the actual words, the construction of writing that I love so much. I enjoy reading about words, why we use them, how we can use them, switch them about and make them sound more interesting or more appealing to the eyes.
It made me want to pick up a pen, or at least perch myself at my laptop for a few good hours and re-assemble everything I have ever written.
When I wrote the post below however many days ago, I was not a happy bunny. No. I was annoyed, pissed off and agitated beyond belief. Why was nothing going my way? Why does life suck? Why does my life suck in particular? Why is it that no matter what I do or try to do, I end up failing and things end up becoming even more shit? Blah, blah, blah. Moan, moan, moan.
And I had to blame it on someone. I had to blame the reason behind why everything I write (and perhaps everything I do) on someone or even something. So I blamed uni. Because isn't that the most logical answer?
Of course I wouldn't blame it on myself! Are you crazy? I am Sam, ladies and gentlemen. I am young, deep, depressed and hard to understand. I live my life the way I live my life, because I am just so up myself, and so complex, that nobody will ever understand me except me, therefore, my reasonings behind everything I do, will forever and always remain a mystery.
Only I'm not so fucking complex, and I'm sure as hell not a mystery. I am average. I'm normal. I'm every other 20-something university student that is trying to Figure It Out.
After Easter break, and I finally left the flat (which, to be honest, I think was a wonderful thing, and I should never be allowed to stay indoors for more than two days, regardless of my health), I got a bit more perspective and have accepted that yeah, while the majority of the things I write are shit, it's nobody's fault by my own. If I'm not going to my lectures, reading my books, keeping an open mind and listening to the constructive criticism, then of course I'm always going to sit in my shitty little flat, eating beans from cans and wondering why nobody understands the complexities of my labyrinth brain. I should stop being so fucking proud, accept my weaknesses and work on them.
So that's what I've been doing, and I've realized a lot over just a few short days. I'm hoping that one of these days, I'll be able to construct my own beautiful sentence like Virginia Woolf's that I quoted above, and will always remember the crush that I developed when I was in the second grade on words, sentences, paragraphs and stories as a whole.